Restrictions to Access

No restrictions. Open for research.

Copyright Notice

Copyright is retained by the authors of items in these papers, or their descendants, as stipulated by United States copyright law.

Preferred Citation

[Identification of item], in the Tillman and Norwood Ledgers #2901, Southern Historical Collection, The Wilson Library, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Alternate Form of Material

All or part of this collection is available on microfilm from University Publications of America as part of the Records of ante-bellum southern plantations from the Revolution through the Civil War, Series J.

Acquisitions Information

Received from Edith Kyle Harrison of Columbus, Georgia, in September 1952.

Sensitive Materials Statement

Manuscript collections and archival records may contain materials with sensitive or confidential information that is protected under federal or state right to privacy laws and regulations, the North Carolina Public Records Act (N.C.G.S. § 132 1 et seq.), and Article 7 of the North Carolina State Personnel Act (Privacy of State Employee Personnel Records, N.C.G.S. § 126-22 et seq.). Researchers are advised that the disclosure of certain information pertaining to identifiable living individuals represented in this collection without the consent of those individuals may have legal ramifications (e.g., a cause of action under common law for invasion of privacy may arise if facts concerning an individual's private life are published that would be deemed highly offensive to a reasonable person) for which the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill assumes no responsibility.

The following terms from Library of Congress Subject Headings suggest topics, persons, geography, etc. interspersed through the entire collection; the terms do not usually represent discrete and easily identifiable portions of the collection--such as folders or items.

Clicking on a subject heading below will take you into the University Library's online catalog.

• African Americans--Medical care--Alabama--History--19th century.
• Crawford (Ala.)--History--19th century.
• Dentistry--Practice--Alabama--History--19th century.
• Medicine--Formulae, receipts, prescriptions--History--19th century.
• Medicine--Practice--Accounting--History--19th century.
• Medicine--Practice--Alabama--History--19th century.
• Norwood, John, fl. 1859-1868.
• Physicians--Alabama--History--19th century.
• Russell County (Ala.)--History.
• Slaves--Medical care--Alabama.
• Tillman, James A., fl. 1860-1862.

• SLAVE BIRTH RECORD (#672), in which some of the names of entries, including those of slaves are duplicated.

The collection is two ledgers relating to the medical practice of Norwood and Tillman. Volume 1 (126 p.) contains entries about Norwood's practice, 1859-1866, with only a few entries for 1860-1862, the period during which he appears to have shared a practice with Tillman. Volume 2 (398 p.) contains Tillman and Norwood entries, 1860-1862, and Norwood entries, 1866- 1868, when the partnership seems to have been dissolved. Entries in both ledgers show dats of treatment and payment received, and, before and after the Civil War, notes of which patients were Black. Many entries, especially in Volume 1, consist only of "advice and medicine for self." Other entries, however, list the patient's complaint and the treatment rendered. Tillman and Norwood typically dressed wounds, delivered babies, lanced fingers, and prescribed morphine, quinine, and laudanum. Tooth extraction was also an important part of their practice; an entry on 26 August 1860 shows that Tillman was paid in whisky for "nicking [sic] out two teeth with a hammer and nail."